How to Add and Validate Digital Signage URLs

Specs and Requirements for Digital Signage

Support for Solstice Pods with Enterprise Edition Licenses

Configured in the Solstice Dashboard

Requires software version 3.4 or later (both Pods and Dashboard)

URL support for IFrames. IMPORTANT NOTE: The signage source URL must be viewable within an IFrame when Footer Only or Footer + Overlay signage modes are enabled. This means that the content must be embedded in an iframe within the website used for the source URL. IFrame support is not required when signage is enabled in Full Screen mode.

HTML content is played back via an Android webview on the Solstice Pod. Therefore, the source URL content must be compatible with Android webview.

A Chrome browser and Android Webview are similar in many ways, but Android Webview will lack some advanced browser features and behaves best with less resource-intensive feeds.

Test your URL in Solstice, and verify that it is playing well on a single display before rolling out to other Solstice Pods and/or leaving signage enabled on the single Pod.

If the URL you are attempting to run is resource intensive, stability and performance can be negatively affected. If you are experiencing a negative impact on stability and performance, you can change the URL or disable Digital Signage.

How to Deploy Signage

As a note, not all signage feeds are supported by Solstice. Always validate signage playback in a test environment before production deployment. Follow the steps below to enable and validate your signage feed.

Step 1: Configure a single Solstice Pod

Open the Solstice Dashboard and select a single Solstice display in the left-hand Instances Panel.

Go to the Digital Signage tab of the Dashboard and select Enable.

Choose a signage mode: Full Screen, Footer Only, or Footer + Overlay. View the image to the right of the options to preview the different modes.

In the Source URL field, enter the URL of the web content you’d like to display between Solstice sessions.

In the Start After drop-down, select the desired signage start time interval.

Click Apply in the bottom right corner of the Solstice Dashboard.

If a pop-up appears to confirm the URL has been validated, click Yes.

Some signage providers require you to confirm/register signage endpoints. Please refer to your signage content providers' documentation/instructions to complete this process as needed.

Step 2: Validate signage on the Solstice Pod

Physically go to the location of the Solstice Pod where you enabled signage.

Confirm the signage feed is visible.

Connect to the Pod and share a piece of content.

Disconnect and confirm the signage feed automatically reappears, plays the entire feed, and restarts the feed from the beginning.

Step 3: Enable signage on your other Pods.

In the Instances panel in the Solstice Dashboard, select the additional Solstice Pods that you’d like to enable the tested signage feed for.

Go to the Digital Signage tab of the Dashboard and select Enable.

In the Source URL field, enter the validated source URL.

Choose a signage mode: Full Screen, Footer Only, or Footer + Overlay. View the image to the right of the options to preview the different modes.

In the Start After drop-down, select the desired signage start time interval.

Click Apply in the bottom right corner of the Solstice Dashboard.

If a pop-up appears to confirm the URL has been validated, click Yes.

Confirm/register your endpoints as required by your signage content provider. This may require you to enable signage one Pod at a time.

Step 4: Repeat the process each time you enable a new or modified signage URL.

Every new or modified signage feed should be validated before being deployed in your production environment.

Step 5: Ensure the admin password is set for each Pod that has signage enabled.

If an admin password isn’t already set, select the Pod in the left hand instances panel of the Solstice Dashboard.

Comments

1. It should be made more clear that to use the footer or footer and overlay options the URL must be embedded.

2. While I have been able to make the video autoplay, I have yet to be able to get it to successfully loop. I have messed with the HTML manually and Solstice just refuses to recognize it. Any suggestions on this?